Podocnemis unifilis, the yellow-spotted Amazon River turtle (Podocnemididae), is widespread in the Amazon and Orinoco drainages of northern South America (Zug, 1993; Iverson, 1992; King and Burke, 1992).

The podocnemidids are a group of pleurodire, or side-necked, turtles known today from South America, Africa, and Madagascar. They enjoyed a broader distribution in the past (i.e., Hamadachelys), occurring in North America, Europe, and India in the Cretaceous and Tertiary (de Broin, 1988; Pritchard and Trebbau, 1984). The living pleurodires consist of the Chelidae (Australia, South America) and the Pelomedusoides (Podocnemididae; and the African Pelomedusidae, i.e., Pelusios).

About the Species

This specimen, a female, was collected by H. Bassler in 1930 from the Rio Ucayali, Contamana, Peru. It was made available to the University of Texas High-Resolution X-ray CT Facility for scanning by Dr. Gene Gaffney of the American Museum of Natural History, in collaboration with Dr. Timothy Rowe of The University of Texas at Austin. Funding for scanning was provided by a National Science Foundation Digital Libraries Initiative grant to Dr. Rowe.

About this Specimen

The specimen was scanned by Richard Ketcham and Matthew Colbert on 01 November 2000 along the coronal axis for a total of 444 slices, each slice 0.190 mm thick, with an interslice spacing of 0.190 mm. The animations displayed below were reduced for optimal Web delivery from the original, much higher resolution CT data. Several unreduced sample CT slices are presented on this page to illustrate some key anatomical features of Podocnemis.